Guest Columns

Of all the recorded hurricanes to hit the United States since 1851, 36 per cent of them have made landfall in Florida. However, the state did have 18 hurricane seasons pass without a known storm impacting the state.
Although hurricane season officially opens on June 1 of each year, st the month of highest activity has historically been September followed by October and then August. Weather officials began using female names to identify hurricanes in 1953 and followed with males names in 1979. The Saffir-Simpson scale for measuring hurricane strength was created in 1975.

" Ships, Sailors and Shipwrecks of Civil War Florida" is the theme of the current exhibit at the Museum of Florida History in Tallahassee. Visitors are offered a glimpse into several aspects of the war previously undocumented. The exhibit contains a collection of artifacts recovered from Florida wrecks and also the items on loan from the Smithsonian Institution and Florida Division of Historical Resources.

Levy County Historian
Atsena Otie - the island you see from the restaurants and the big dock on the waterfront in Cedar Key has a long history. The cemetery located on the island is the final resting place for a cross section of the early pioneer families of Levy County.

In April of 1929, a group called the Patrons of Williston Grammar School contacted Florida Gov. Doyle E. Carlton to lodge a complaint against the Levy County School Board. At issue was the closing of the grammar school two months early, while the high school continued classes for the full eight-month term.
The Patrons argued that in 1927, they privately paid $4.00 per month for the two last months of school so the students could have a full eight-month term. The following year, they paid for one month so students could have an eight-month term.

By Toni C. CollinsLevy County Historian
In March of 1933, as many as 15 million people - a quarter of the nation’s workers - had no job and no hope of finding one. Factories lay idle, storefronts vacant, fields plowed under. State governments, cities, and towns had exhausted their meager relief funds.

By TONI C. COLLINS
Levy County Historian
The Federal government has conducted a census or account of its population every year since 1790. In that year the census takers, who were U.S. marshals on horseback, counted 3.9 million inhabitants.
Why did the government undertake such a huge project? As America expanded, the nation’s interests grew more complex and the government needed to plan for that new growth.